CIA and FBI agents hunting for al-Qaida militants in the Horn of Africa have been interrogating terrorism suspects from 19 countries held at secret prisons in Ethiopia, which is notorious for torture and abuse, according to an investigation by The Associated Press. Human rights groups, lawyers and several Western diplomats assert hundreds of prisoners, who include women and children, have been transferred secretly and illegally in recent months from Kenya and Somalia to Ethiopia, where they are kept without charge or access to lawyers and families. The detainees include at least one U.S. citizen and some are from Canada, Sweden and France, according to a list compiled by a Kenyan Muslim rights group and flight manifests obtained by AP. Some were swept up by Ethiopian troops that drove a radical Islamist government out of neighboring Somalia late last year. Others have been deported from Kenya, where many Somalis have fled the continuing violence in their homeland. ... http://abcnews.go.com

General Electric Co., SunTrust Banks Inc. and Eli Lilly & Co. failed to follow US rules that require companies to eliminate jargon when explaining how they pay their top executives. The companies, which paid their chief executive officers a total of $40.7 million last year, are among 40 US corporations that didn't write annual pay reports in ``plain English,'' according to a study that US Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Christopher Cox cited in a speech last month. Cox promised investors that companies would provide ``intelligible disclosure that can be understood by a lay reader'' after the SEC overhauled executive-pay rules in July. The proxy statements for annual shareholder meetings may prompt more scrutiny from Congress, where the House Financial Services Committee is trying to give investors more say over compensation. ``If things are written at a level where two-thirds of the US adult population is unlikely to understand them, then they can hardly be transparent,'' ...http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aQC4UIKY5kn4&refer=exclusive

A French train with a 25,000-horsepower engine and special wheels broke the world speed record today for conventional rail trains, reaching 357.2 mph as it zipped through the countryside to the applause of spectators. The black-and-chrome V150 with three double-decker cars roared like a jet plane, had sparks flying overhead and kicked up a long trail of dust as it surpassed the record of 320.2 mph set in 1990 by another French train. It fell short, however, of beating the ultimate record set by Japan's magnetically levitated train, which hit 361 mph in 2003. The French TGV, or "train a grande vitesse," as the country's bullet train is called, had two engines on either side of the three double-decker cars for the record run, some 125 miles east of the capital on a new track linking Paris with Strasbourg. Aboard the V150, the sensation was comparable to that of an airplane at takeoff. ...http://www.washingtontimes.com/world/20070403-124749-9606r.htm

Having trouble making ends meet living on your retirement nest egg? You might be owed some pension money. A total of $133 million in retirement benefits haven’t been claimed, the federal agency that insures private pension plans reported Tuesday. The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. said 32,000 people are owed money. Individual benefits range from $1 up to $611,028. The average unclaimed benefit is about $4,950. “Although the vast majority of workers receive their full pension, sometimes people lose track of benefits earned with former employers,” said Vince Snowbarger, the agency’s interim director. The agency urged people who may have lost track of a pension earned during their career and think they may be owed retirement benefits to conduct a search using PBGC’s online directory at www.pbgc.gov. People can search by their last name, company name or state where the company was headquartered, the PBGC said....http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17929857/

Is it a local border conflict or beginning of a dangerous confrontation? In the drama surrounding 15 captured British sailors, Tehran is resorting to propaganda while London is relying on the West for support. Iran has a long history of using hostages as diplomatic pawns. Rarely is an Arab League summit more than a collection of 22 men on somewhat frosty terms issuing meaningless statements. But that wasn't the case last week in Riyadh, where what Saudi Arabian King Abdullah had to say to his "honorable brothers" sounded more like a lecture to the entire Middle East. "In wounded Palestine the mighty people suffer from oppression & occupation," the monarch said. "In beloved Iraq blood is flowing between brothers in the shadow of an illegitimate foreign occupation & abhorrent sectarianism threatens a civil war. Lebanon is virtually paralyzed. In Sudan the weakness of the Arabs has led to foreign intervention & in Somalia one civil war is ending but only so that the next one can begin."...http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,475229,00.html

Predictions that the US-backed Ethiopian invasion of Somalia last Christmas would hasten rather than halt the country's political disintegration are proving grimly accurate. In the league of failed states, Somalia is runaway leader. With international attention focused on Zimbabwe & Darfur, it is the hidden shame of the world. More than 1,000 civilians have been killed or wounded in recent fighting in the capital, Mogadishu, & tens of thousands have fled their homes. The UN says wounded civilians are lying untended in the streets after heavy artillery and mortars pounded residential areas. Since February, 96,000 refugees have swelled the ranks of Somalia's 400,000 internally displaced persons. And despite a temporary truce today, it seems likely that worse is to come. Ethiopia's defeat of local Islamist forces, known as the Council of Islamic Courts, that seized control of Mogadishu last year was accomplished with the help of American air strikes, intelligence and logistical support. ...http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/simon_tisdall/2007/04/somalia_slips_ever_backwards_h.html